In the upcoming weekend, Brazilians will cast their votes to
elect a new President in a democratic fashion. What does a democratic
election mean? Unfortunately, there are many meanings. At one
extreme, a totalitarian regime can conduct an 'election' in which one (and only
one) slate is presented and 100% of the valid votes will go to this slate.
This may narrowly satisfy the definition of a vote by the people, but this would
be objectively regarded as a sham due to the absence of any other choice.
At the other extreme, a totally free democracy is one in which anyone can run
for any position and that the people can vote for any candidate. In
practice, there are some limitations due to barriers of entry. In a large
democracy, not all candidates are well-known and therefore the advantage goes to
rich candidates or candidates from political parties with huge financial,
political and human resources who can effectively buy an election through mass
advertising and marketing. US Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle said,
"This is now a club for millionaires. You either have to have lots of
money or you're indebted to somebody for the rest of your life."

To balance the inequities of political campaign resources,
Brazil gives free television air time to candidates. Television is the
target medium of choice since it has nearly universal reach. Television is
also a public concession, so that all licensees must abide by the governmental
regulations. For several months before the election, the broadcast
television stations yield two hours per day for political programs. These
special television programs are prepared by the candidates themselves, so that
there can be no complaint of distortion. The major candidates all have
sophisticated advertising professionals working on their television
programs. For further details, see this article
in Guardian and this article
in Brazzil. In the Guardian article, the political scientist, Jairo
Nicolau, believes that 'no other country in the world gives as much free airtime
to candidates than Brazil.' In the USA, the comparable number is much
lower (in the order of several hours of broadcast public debates during the
entire campaign). In the Brazzil article, "Former finance minister
Mailson de Nóbrega recently pointed out that not only do 90 percent of
Brazilian homes have television but the lower social classes use it as the main
source of information. Voters from this section of the population tend to form
their opinions from what they see on the screen."

It is one thing to broadcast political programs in order to
inform the electorate. But does anyone actually watch these
programs? This is the question that we will attempt to address in this
article. Our data come from the TGI Brasil study. This is a
survey of 5,312 persons between the ages of 12 and 64 years old conducted during
the first half of 2002. The survey universe includes the nine major
cities, as well as urban portions of São Paulo state and the southeast area of
Brazil. Within this survey, the respondents were asked if they frequently
watch political programs on television. According to the TGI Brasil study,
15.4% said that they frequently watch these programs, 23.9% said they sometimes
watch and then 57.4% said they never watch these programs. Although
television has near universal reach as a mass medium, the political programs
reach less than half of the population even though they appear every day on
prime time hours.

In the following chart, we show the incidence of viewing by
age/sex groups. Obviously, the interest is significantly higher among
adults since young teenagers do not have voting rights yet. Men are more
interested in watching political programs than women.

(source: TGI Brasil)

In the Guardian article, a Workers party press officer
Carlos Tibrucio was quoted as saying: "TV is the only way that many people
can get involved in the democratic process. TV has a decisive role among the
less educated. It could decide the entire election." The
premise is that the types of political discourse that are available in print
media (newspaper and magazines) do not diffuse deeply into the lower
socio-economic stratum, due to lower literacy levels and/or
access.

In the next chart, we show the incidence of viewing by
socio-economic level, education and occupation. Even though television is
nearly universal in reach, the interest in these programs decreases as we step
down the socio-economic ladder. There are multiple interpretations, which
cannot be resolved by these survey data. First of all, this may be because
the lower classes feel disconnected from political processes. What, for
example, is the difference between choosing one rich, powerful and corrupt politician
over another? Alternately, the lower classes are smart enough to see
through these self-serving television propaganda that are manufactured by the
candidates themselves. The wonder, then, is why does anyone watch any of
it, other than to criticize them for their distortions and lack of substance?

So far, we see that half the population never watch the
political television programs. Furthermore, among the frequent viewers,
relatively few of them are the lower classes who presumably use television as
their main source of information. Does this negate the concept of
political television programs? At present, the criticism appears to exist
at two levels. The first level is directed towards the candidates and the
political parties, to the point where these political programs are
affectionately referred to as Quem Rouba Mas (Who Steals
More). Whereas democracy is the opposite of 'no choice' or 'a single
forced choice,' it should not be a choice between two crooks either. At
this level, then, the problem is not with these television programs per se,
but with reforming the politics-as-usual environment. At another level,
potential telespectators may find these programs to be boring, insubstantial,
hypocritical, base and vile. In that case, the producers will reap
what they sow and be punished at the polling stations. After all, that is
the point of a democracy.